'Self-seeding' of cancer cells may play critical role in tumour progression
Sunday, 3 January 2010
A new study shows that circulating tumour cells on cancer cells that break away from a primary tumour and spread to other areas of the body-- could also return to and grow in the tumour of origin, a newly discovered process called "self-seeding" which may play a critical role in tumour progression," reports BSS.
Cancer progression used to be commonly thought of as a process involving the growth of a primary tumour followed by metastasis, in which cancer cells leave the primary tumor and spread to distant organs.
The findings of the study, published in the December 25 issue of the journal Cell, suggest that self-seeding can enhance tumour growth through the release of signals that promote angiogenesis, invasion, and metastasis to release, said Friday.
"Our work not only provides evidence for the self-seeding phenomenon and reveals the mechanism of this process, but it also shows the possible role of self-seeding in tumour progression," said the study's first Author Mi-Young Kim, PhD, Research Fellow in the Cancer Biology and Genetics Programme at Memorial Sloan- Kettering.
According to the research, which was conducted on mice, self- seeding involves two distinct functions: the ability of a tumour to attract its own circulating progeny and the ability of circulating tumour cells to re-infiltrate the tumour in response to this attraction.
The investigators identified four genes that are responsible for executing these functions: IL-6 and IL-8, which attract the most aggressive segment of the circulating tumour cells population, and FSCN1 and MMP1, which mediate the infiltration of circulating tumour cells into a tumour.
Cancer progression used to be commonly thought of as a process involving the growth of a primary tumour followed by metastasis, in which cancer cells leave the primary tumor and spread to distant organs.
The findings of the study, published in the December 25 issue of the journal Cell, suggest that self-seeding can enhance tumour growth through the release of signals that promote angiogenesis, invasion, and metastasis to release, said Friday.
"Our work not only provides evidence for the self-seeding phenomenon and reveals the mechanism of this process, but it also shows the possible role of self-seeding in tumour progression," said the study's first Author Mi-Young Kim, PhD, Research Fellow in the Cancer Biology and Genetics Programme at Memorial Sloan- Kettering.
According to the research, which was conducted on mice, self- seeding involves two distinct functions: the ability of a tumour to attract its own circulating progeny and the ability of circulating tumour cells to re-infiltrate the tumour in response to this attraction.
The investigators identified four genes that are responsible for executing these functions: IL-6 and IL-8, which attract the most aggressive segment of the circulating tumour cells population, and FSCN1 and MMP1, which mediate the infiltration of circulating tumour cells into a tumour.